What nationality was Santa Claus? The correct answer is: Turkish.

St Nicholas was born in Demre, a town lying on the coast of today's Turkey, by the Mediterranean Sea. Born in the third century, Nicholas was a bishop of Mira in Anatolia; history tells us that having received an impressive inheritance, he shared it with the less fortunate by secretly distributing gifts.

As a miracle-worker, he saved a drowning sailor from an oceanic catastrophe, saved the hungry population of town and resurrected three small children, who had been murdered by a butcher and drowned in brine, for later sale as ham.

He was made, among others, the patron of towns such as Antwerp, Berlin, Glasgow, Moscow, Novogrod as well as New York; and a patron (among others) of children, confectioners, perfume and wine vendors, pilgrims, judges and notaries.

Tradition also tells us that the bones of Saint Nicholas, which were kept as reliquaries, exude manna on the 6th of December every year. Depite the fact that the bones were stolen and moved to the seaside town of Bari, the inhabitants of Bari happily collect manna into flasks each year.

From where, however, does the modern image of the red-white Santa Claus originate?

The Dutch Sinterklaas (also called Sint-Nicolaas) was the model upon which the American Santa Claus was created. During the American War of Independence, the inhabitants of New York (a former colony of Holland, then New Amsterdam) recreated the tradition of Sinterklaas, which had symbolised an un-American past for them. The name of Santa Claus himself derives from the Old Dutch Sinte Klaas.

A citizen of New York, Clement Clarke Moore, wrote the famous 1823 poem ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas’ for his children. From that moment, the figure of a man distributing presents to families at Christmas, was created. In the 1860’s the American artists Thomas Nast began drawing images of a fat, jolly Santa Claus, on the bais of Moore’s poem.

Then, in 1931, Haddon Sundblom drew the popular figure of Santa as we know him today, for the beverage producer Coca Cola. The pictures were used by Coca Cola in their advertisements on highways, stores and reached the television screens of American families. The jolly man in a red coat, with a distinctive black belt and boots, and sporting a white beard, was designed to suggest the idea that Coca Cola quenches “thirst for all seasons” to American consumers.

Photos: Saint Nicholas: st-nicholas; Santa Claus: StNicholasCenter